First Class Murder Read online

  ‘Luckily, Hazel enjoys trains more than boats,’ said my father, hand on my shoulder.

  I could hardly enjoy anything less, I thought as I was steered towards something long and large and covered in smoke. I blinked and the smoke cleared, and then I forgot all about being ill. All the colours came back into my eyes and the world slowed its spin.

  There stood a great fat black engine with gold trim, panting steam. Behind it was a gleaming line of carriages, in cream and gold and blue, all emblazoned with the crest of the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits. Crates of glistening fruit and slabs of butter and bulging packets of meat were being handed up into them by porters in livery. Golden steps had been folded out of each of the carriages, and passengers in gorgeous travelling suits and hats that looked too large to fit through the doors were climbing up, chattering and waving to each other. For a moment it seemed as if all the wealthy people in Europe were there – and soon we would be among them. This was a holiday straight out of books.

  The train was due to depart in just half an hour, and then the unhappy feelings I had been having all term, as though I were stuck in a dress two sizes too small, would be banished for ever. We were about to rush across Europe on a headlong three-day journey – Paris, Lausanne, Simplon, Milan, Ljubljana, Zagreb, Belgrade, Sofia – and when we stopped again properly, we would be in Istanbul, a place so foreign that I could not even imagine it. I felt dizzy with gladness – or perhaps it was still the motion from the ferry. We were out of England, and away from The Trial, and everything would be all right. I was an ordinary not-quite-English girl on holiday with her father and her ordinary English friend. I smiled to myself. I could be on holiday. This was easy.

  Our grand first-class sleeping car was at the very front of the train. It was sleek and newly painted in cream, with a brass plaque on its side that read CALAIS–SIMPLON–ISTANBUL. It seemed hardly real, but of course it was.

  My father led us along the platform, his hand still on my shoulder; Maxwell strode along beside him carrying his briefcase. Hetty followed behind, balancing boxes and ordering the porter about – we seemed to have acquired a porter while I was not noticing things – and up to the golden steps that led into the train itself. We were about to step onto the Orient Express!

  4

  But as we approached the steps, someone pushed in front of my father, stopping us all in our tracks. ‘Excuse me,’ said my father, and the man turned round so quickly that he almost knocked into us. He was very large, wide as well as tall, and he had a moustache and a thick neck like a bull. He looked red and cross, and he squinted at us all as though we had inconvenienced him, just by being there.

  ‘Excuse you,’ he growled to Maxwell. ‘You, sir! Move your servants!’

  I felt my cheeks go red. The man had meant us, my father and me, although my father was wearing his best pinstriped suit, and I my new travelling coat with beautiful black frogging and pearl buttons.

  My father’s shoulders went back. He pushed his glasses up his nose and said, ‘Allow me to introduce myself. I am Mr Vincent Wong, Director of Wong Banking, and this is my man, Maxwell. These children are my daughter, Hazel Wong, and her school friend, the Honourable Daisy Wells. And you are . . .?’

  ‘William Daunt,’ said the man. He did not apologize, or even look sorry. ‘Daunt’s Diet Pills. My lovely wife and I are passengers on this train.’ He gestured, and a woman next to him, who I had hardly noticed before, stepped forward, clutching his hand.

  I gasped. I could not help myself. It was not because of the woman herself. She was quite ordinary, small and pretty in a mousy English way, with pale brown hair, a rather soft, silly expression and a smart powder-blue travelling suit and hat. But around her neck was the most glorious necklace I have ever seen in my life. I had never quite understood before the fascination people in books have about jewels. They are very sparkly, I suppose, but they don’t do anything much. You can’t read jewels, or eat them (I think if you could, they would taste delicious, like fizzy hot-house fruit). Seeing this necklace, though, I began to understand what grown-ups get so excited about. A string of diamonds lay like fire across the lady’s neck – a trail of green and red and blue sparks that I wanted to put my hand against to see if they would feel cold or hot, and just at the dent of her throat sat the most enormous bright ruby, shining out so sharply that it made my teeth ache. Behind me Hetty gasped too, and Daisy said, ‘Now, that . . .!’ She did not need to finish her sentence.

  The woman’s free hand fluttered up to her necklace. ‘How do you do?’ she said in a silly little voice. ‘Isn’t my William wonderful? He bought me this for our first wedding anniversary, so that I could wear it on this journey. It’s simply lovely.’ Her fingers clutched her husband’s sleeve, and she blinked up at him.

  ‘Anything for my wife,’ said Mr Daunt, and he patted her hand, beaming down at her fondly. ‘She is very precious to me. Now, if you will excuse us . . .’ He pushed forward again, guiding Mrs Daunt like a little child, and they went up the steps and onto the train together.

  ‘Do you know who she was?’ whispered Daisy. ‘Georgiana Strange!’

  I must have looked puzzled, because she sighed and said, ‘She was absolutely the wealthiest available heiress after her mother died last year. It was such a scandal – her mother left her everything, and her brother was quite written out of the will. Simply every bachelor in England was chasing after her, but she chose that Mr Daunt. He owns a factory – Daunt’s Diet Pills, you know? I heard he wasn’t doing well, but he must be now if he can afford to buy that necklace! Goodness, what a horrid man he is in person!’

  ‘He can’t be so bad,’ said Hetty, winking at us, ‘if he gives out jewels like that!’

  ‘Hmm,’ said Daisy. ‘I suppose.’

  ‘Daunt’s Diet Pills!’ said my father, who had been speaking to the porter. ‘I must say, if their creator is anything to go by, they don’t do anything for your character. I don’t believe in diet pills, myself. Hazel, you must never take them. Now, shall we board the train?’

  He held out his hand, and I took it and climbed up, out of the ordinary world, into the fat creamy body of the great, glorious Orient Express. All the noises from outside seemed to fade away at once. It was like being wrapped up and soothed in a beautiful blanket – the richest and most gorgeous imaginable.

  The inside of the Orient Express was like a palace in miniature, or the grandest grand hotel. The walls were rich, smooth, golden wood, picked out in beautiful floral marquetry; gold licked up the lamps and picture frames and doors. We stood on a soft, deep blue carpet that stretched away in front of us, down the glowing chandelier-lit corridor, and I knew that here I would have no trouble not being a detective. This was a place quite separate from the rest of the world, so full of marvels that even Daisy could not possibly become bored.

  I looked down the corridor and breathed in its sweet, rich smell. There was a row of neat closed compartment doors along the left-hand side, and I wondered which ones would be ours.

  A man with blond hair, a kind, bland, cheerful face and beautiful gold buttons on his velvety blue jacket came bowing up to us.

  ‘Mr Wong, I presume?’ he said, in a rolling, jolly accent. ‘And this must be Miss Wong and the Honourable Miss Wells. Welcome to the Simplon Orient Express! I am Jocelyn Buri, the conductor in charge of this sleeping car, and I will be looking after you on this journey. If you need anything – anything at all – you must only speak to me, and I will be delighted to be of service. My aim is to ensure that you are happy and comfortable. Now, let me show you to your accommodation.’

  ‘Are you French?’ asked Daisy as he led us along the corridor.

  ‘No, mademoiselle, I am from Austria,’ said Jocelyn, smiling at her. ‘The best country in the world.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Daisy, frowning to hear England dismissed like that.

  We were in the most excellent luck. The front coach, which was taking passengers from Calais to Istanbul, had twel
ve compartments. Eight of them, the nicest, had one bed; the other four, which were supposed to be second best, each contained two bunks, one on top of the other. Daisy and I really ought to have had one compartment each, but as the carriage was quite full we had been placed together in a two-berth compartment – number ten, towards the front, up near the engine. Hetty was next door, in compartment eleven with the Daunts’ maid, while my father was at quite the other end, in compartment three, which had a connecting door to Maxwell in compartment two. This is how my father prefers it – he is always having excellent business ideas at two o’clock in the morning, and bursting into Maxwell’s room so that he can note them down. When I was younger and couldn’t sleep, I would pad in to join them and curl up on my father’s lap, lulled by the rumble of his voice all around me and the rise and fall of his chest under my cheek. Sometimes I would doze and wake up to find pieces of paper balanced on me, as though I were a writing table.

  ‘Goodness,’ said Daisy, when our hat boxes and cases had been stowed in our compartment, and Hetty had tidied away our things in their neat little drawers, ‘isn’t this marvellous? Like the best dorm imaginable. We can have midnight feasts every night if we like!’

  ‘We could have them delivered to the compartment,’ I agreed.

  ‘No!’ said Daisy. ‘That would quite spoil everything. There’s no point to a midnight feast that’s legal. Now, to the important things. Did you know that this train is famous for being full of smugglers and jewel thieves? I read about a lady who was drugged while she slept, and in the morning all her jewels were gone. Do you think that will happen to Mrs Daunt’s necklace?’

  ‘No!’ I exclaimed, before I could stop myself. ‘Stop it, Daisy – just because there was a thief at Fallingford doesn’t mean they’re everywhere.’

  Daisy froze, the way she always does when I bring up The Trial, and I cringed a bit. I don’t like reminding her – or myself – about it, but lately things have been coming into my head and out of my mouth before I can stop them.

  ‘I – I only meant,’ I stammered, ‘that it isn’t likely—’

  ‘Honestly, Hazel, there can be more than one thief in the world. There are whole gangs of them, as you know perfectly well. And anyway, that wasn’t only about jewels.’

  I could feel that sitting between us like a boulder.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said, and we both went to the door of our compartment to see who else was getting on the train.

  5

  The first person we saw was a small blonde woman in a maid’s uniform, pretty and pink-cheeked. She glared at us most crossly as she went rushing past. We could hear Mrs Daunt’s silly whining voice crying, ‘Sarah! Sarah! I need you!’

  That must be Mrs Daunt’s maid, I thought, who was sharing with Hetty. She did not look very nice. The door to Mrs Daunt’s compartment closed, but through it we heard Sarah shout, ‘Well? What do you want this time?’

  ‘William, she’s being cruel again!’ wailed Mrs Daunt, just as loudly.

  ‘Sarah, I’ve told you before, I won’t have this!’ snapped Mr Daunt. He sounded positively furious. ‘Once more and I shall—’ and then he lowered his voice and we heard nothing more.

  Daisy looked at me, eyebrow raised. ‘Goodness!’ she said. ‘How rude that maid was!’

  ‘I’m sure it’s nothing,’ I said, but I was worried. I knew that look. Daisy was having Thoughts, and Thoughts usually led to new cases for the Detective Society. I knew that Daisy wanted to take her mind off The Trial, and this was the easiest way she knew to do it.

  I stared down the beautiful long hush of the corridor, blue and gold and glowing, and as I did so, the train shifted under me, shaking and growling like a living thing ready to leap forward. I wobbled and clutched Daisy’s arm, and she grinned at me.

  Then there was a commotion at the carriage door. Out on the platform, a sharp voice was shouting, ‘Come along! Come along, Alexander! Open the door, my good man!’

  Jocelyn rushed forward and threw it open, bowing deeply. ‘Countess Demidovskoy!’ we heard him say. ‘Master Arcady!’ We craned forward, terribly excited, as onto the train came the person who had been speaking, with someone else following her. Bags and cases – a really surprising number of them – were piled on behind, and then the door slammed shut again, blocking out the platform noise like a blade coming down on a block.

  The person who had shouted was an old lady – the little, bird-like sort that shrivels up rather than puffs out, with white hair and immaculately tailored grey travelling clothes. She clasped a thin silver cane in her grey gloved hand, and her eyes darted about crossly. She was quite beautiful, and quite frightening.

  With a lift of his finger, Jocelyn directed porters to collect the luggage – but while he was doing so the lady began to stalk down the corridor towards us. She was evidently not the sort of person who waited.

  ‘My lady!’ said Jocelyn. ‘May I introduce myself—?’

  ‘There is no need to give me your name,’ snapped the lady – the Countess.

  Countess sounded very European indeed; the sort of misty, dastardly European-ness of the villains in Daisy’s spy stories. (Daisy, by the way, has been reading lots of spy novels this summer. Her favourite is John Buchan, and now she wants the Detective Society to have its own costume department. Daisy in a beard and plus fours would be pushing it a bit, I think, but Daisy says that this isn’t what she means at all, and that I am just being obtuse. I wish Daisy would not use long words like that. Long words are my speciality, after all.) But where in Europe was this countess from? Her accent was very odd – it sounded like the girls at Deepdean when they pretend to be Russian spies. Could she be Russian? I knew all about the dreadful things the Russians had done to their royals, especially the Tsar and his family (Beanie had found out about the poor little princesses last term and wept for a whole day) – but I had never seen one in the flesh. I stared in fascination.

  ‘I assume you will be attending us?’ the old lady went on.

  ‘Yes, my lady,’ said Jocelyn, bowing again. His cheeks had turned slightly pinker. ‘Now, we have you in compartment eight, and your grandson next to you, in number nine. His is a double, but its other berth is free – we hope you will both be quite comfortable.’

  Grandson? I thought. I pulled my eyes away from the Countess and looked at last at the person behind her. It was a boy who looked exactly the same age as Daisy and me. He was fair and thin-faced, with quite a lot of rather nice blond hair and good eyebrows; and he was clearly still growing, for his ankles and wrists stuck out awkwardly from his clothes, and his cheekbones were sharp. He looked like Little Lord Fauntleroy partly grown up. He caught my eye, and I looked away quickly. A boy!

  ‘Humph!’ said the Countess sharply. ‘That is not what I asked for. Two single compartments. This will be noted. However, I suppose you had better show them to me. Come along, Alexander.’

  ‘Yes, Grandmother,’ the boy said, and I blinked in surprise. The words were English, but the voice that spoke them was not Russian, and not English either. It was trying to imitate the clipped way that Daisy speaks, but there was a funny drawl behind the syllables that did not sound like any accent I had ever heard.

  They came past us – the Countess ignoring us, the boy turning to stare at us. His look made me uncomfortable. It was direct and curious, as though he were used to looking at whatever he liked.

  I did not enjoy it. I hoped that Daisy was thinking the same thing, and I was glad to see that she was staring back at the boy, coolly and without dropping her gaze. She stared in the same way as he did, as though she had every right to, and would do so whatever anyone else might think.

  As Jocelyn passed us, he looked from us to Alexander, and winked. I felt myself turn scarlet. I do hate it when grown-ups imagine romance where there isn’t any.

  The doors to their compartments closed behind them, and then Daisy motioned me backwards and our door swung to as well. She was looking quite gleeful.

 
‘A Russian on the Orient Express!’ she said, her eyes gleaming. ‘I wonder why she’s here? Do you think she’s fleeing a dark past? And why does that boy sound American instead of Russian? Ooh – perhaps he isn’t really her grandson . . . Perhaps she’s kidnapped him!’

  ‘No she hasn’t!’ I said, realizing that Daisy was right about the boy’s American accent. ‘He didn’t look kidnapped at all.’ But Daisy was not listening to me.

  ‘Hazel,’ she hissed, fizzing with excitement, ‘we are already discovering that this train is full of mysteries!’

  ‘Don’t, Daisy!’ I said. ‘I told you, we mustn’t do any detecting. My father won’t allow it.’

  ‘I don’t see what your father has to do with it,’ said Daisy. ‘If there’s something going on, there’s something going on, that’s all. And if we’re on the spot, we have to investigate.’

  ‘No we don’t,’ I told her firmly. ‘Not this hols.’

  I wanted to explain that my father wouldn’t accept that sort of excuse. He wouldn’t understand that we had to be detectives sometimes; everything, to my father, is a choice, and someone is always responsible for whatever happens. He is not happy until he can point his finger at them and make them put it right. I had not thought of this before, but I see now that that makes the two of us rather similar.

  Daisy plopped down on the edge of her bunk and pulled out a hardback from her travelling bag. I should not have been surprised to see that it was Murder on the Orient Express.

  ‘You can’t read that, Daisy!’ I said.

  ‘Stop saying can’t. Of course I can,’ said Daisy. ‘I can read whatever I like. And anyway, it might give us ideas for when we begin our investigation.’

  ‘There isn’t going to be an investigation,’ I said.